Hawaii Law Enforcement Recruitment Crisis — Policy Response

Summary of the paper

"The Recruitment Crisis" is an ISPI policy brief on why Hawaii's law enforcement agencies struggle to hire and keep officers. It argues that the problem is structural compensation, not recruitment marketing: once Hawaii's housing and living costs are counted, officers' real compensation is lower than a nominal salary comparison suggests, which pushes trained officers toward mainland departments.

The brief argues that non-salary benefits such as housing assistance, loan forgiveness and cost-of-living supplements produce more retention per dollar than equivalent base salary increases.

What the paper finds

• Cost of living drives the gap. Comparing salaries alone hides the effect of Hawaii's housing and rent costs on what officers can actually afford.
• Vacancies have cascading effects. The brief identifies four compounding consequences: slower emergency response, reduced detective capacity, rising mandatory overtime that raises wellness risk, and less capacity for community engagement.
• Community engagement is the hardest to rebuild. The brief describes the loss of community engagement capacity as a long-term crime prevention cost that is difficult to recover once lost.

What it recommends

• Create a Hawaii law enforcement cost-of-living retention supplement indexed to Hawaii's actual cost of living rather than national salary benchmarks.
• Establish a law enforcement housing assistance program modeled on Hawaii's teacher housing program.
• Create an education loan forgiveness program for officers who complete multi-year service commitments.
• Reform federal law enforcement workforce grant formulas to include Hawaii and Pacific territory cost-of-living adjustments.

Who it's for

Police and sheriff leadership, county councils, the Hawaii Legislature, police unions and federal workforce grant administrators.

Cite as

Pulley, Warren (2026). The Recruitment Crisis: Why Hawaii's Law Enforcement Agencies Cannot Hire — and What Policy Must Change (ISPI PB-12). Island Security Policy Institute, Honolulu. https://ispiglobal.com/papers-landing/pb12-hawaii-law-enforcement-recruitment https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.23450019

@techreport{ispipb122026,
  author      = {Pulley, Warren},
  title       = {The Recruitment Crisis: Why Hawaii's Law Enforcement Agencies Cannot Hire — and What Policy Must Change},
  institution = {Island Security Policy Institute},
  address     = {Honolulu, HI},
  number      = {ISPI PB-12},
  year        = {2026},
  url         = {https://ispiglobal.com/papers-landing/pb12-hawaii-law-enforcement-recruitment},
  doi         = {10.5281/zenodo.23450019}
}

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